Tom Chivers is the Telegraph's assistant comment editor. He writes mainly on science. Not a poet - that's the other Tom Chivers. Read older posts by Tom here.

Why does David Cameron care about Jimmy Carr's taxes?

David Cameron with his New Best Friend, the diligent taxpayer Gary Barlow

I've been in a couple of brief debates on Twitter. Why, people say, is David Cameron denouncing Jimmy Carr's tax avoidance as "morally wrong"? Surely, as the head of Her Majesty's Government, he is in the unique position of being able to do something about it? He is, in the words of one, "presiding over the system that allows Carr to get away with it", and therefore bears some responsibility.

I disagree. Cameron is entitled to say that something is morally wrong without legislating against it. I have no doubt that he believes that cheating on one's spouse is morally wrong, but we would all be disgusted if he were to outlaw it. Perhaps there is a case to be made that, in the particular example of tax avoidance, the Government should take action, but we don't, in general, look to the law to settle our moral debates.

The bigger question is: since when does the Prime Minister have an opinion what a mid-ranking stand-up comedian does with his tax? Why has this become a standard of British politics, that the Prime Minister is asked for comment on whatever tawdry nonsense happens to float to the top of the celebrity septic tank? Why can he not simply say "I'm sorry, we have the whole of Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs in place to deal with this sort of thing. Please go and speak to their press office. Personally, I neither know nor care what Jimmy Carr's tax affairs are. I barely know who he is. Is he the camp one with the big teeth who was on Who Do You Think You Are?" Maybe it's a bit of revenge, because no doubt Carr has been rude about Cameron in the past, but surely a prime minister should be able to rise above these things.

But no, since Tony Blair or thereabouts, politics has become celebrity's nerdy younger brother, desperately standing next to it at parties, trying to hang around with who it thinks, usually mistakenly, are the cool people. Inviting Oasis to Downing Street, bringing bloody Mumford & Sons on Air Force One. Getting Sir Alan (now Lord) Sugar to advise the Government on entrepreneurship. Hanging around with Gary Barlow OBE (himself a proud taxpayer, we learn). It's tiresome beyond reckoning. I don't want to sound like Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells, but it slightly makes me long for the days of Alec Douglas-Home or something. I can't imagine him commenting on what tax band Spike Milligan should have been in.

That's the politics we've got, though, I suppose, and it's silly to grumble. But from a practical point of view, Cameron seems to have left a landmine in the drive for his party. If it's immoral to "aggressively" (read: successfully) avoid tax, would the Prime Minister mind asking his Cabinet and all major Conservative donors to release their tax returns for 2011-2012?